Just in time for Pixar’s great movie hit “Coco” comes an intellectual book that not only will help you understand this already beloved animated film, but also help you understand the impact of Mexican American in United States society.

All those masks, sugar skulls and dancing skeletons at “Dia de los Muertos” observations have a reason for existing, and author Robert Con Davis-Undiano makes sure you understand their meaning in what most certainly is the most important book done by an American author in the 21st century.

More about sugar skulls, later.

In “Mestizos Come Home! Making and claiming Mexican American Identity,” Davis-Undiano documents the great awakening of Mexican American and Latino culture in the United States. He believes this was an evolutionary event which started in the 16th century with the appearance of the Mestizos – people with European (Spanish) and indigenous roots.

The evolution has a history of struggle for the people – first under the iron fist of Spanish conquistadores and then under oppressive and racist countries in the United States, Mexico and other Latin American countries.

Eventually, the evolution reached its peak and broke loose of the chain of oppression with the 1960s Chicano Renaissance in art and literature. He espouses the theory of Atzlan, the mythical homeland of the Aztec and Mexica that is believed to be somewhere in the American Southwest. In Santa Fe, N.M., he muses, but perhaps anywhere.

He calls the Mestizo “searchers.” Mestizo are searching for their homeland, their culture, their place in history and their right to exist in a turbulent world that often belittled them and thought of them only as manual labor, peasants and not worthy of praise. But, he claims the Mestizo truly is that grand mix of people Mexican philosopher Jose Vasconcelos called “La Raza Cosmica (The Cosmic People)” with both indigenous and Spanish blood running through their veins and pumping their heart with a new vigor never seen on Earth.

The Mestizo is mainly brown, featuring a bronze skin that beckons their ties to the land and gives them a sense of belonging. But, they could also be white like their European ancestors. He explains the arrival of “La Raza Cosmica” by reviewing Spain’s “Casta (Caste)” System and Paintings that tried to explain how the children of mixed-race marriages would use. Of the at least 16 types of people the Spanish found evolved by the intermingling of cultures and people, the Mestizo stands out as the most prominent.

Born into this new world, the Mestizo at times felt as if there was no homeland. Davis-Undiano begs to differ. Because of the Mestizo’s indigenous roots and ties to the Spanish explorers, that homeland has always been in the southwestern United States. Now, he argues, it’s time for the Mestizo’s to come back to the native lands and claim the culture that they have slowly developed over the past five centuries. Davis-Undiano invites the Mestizo to not only come back home, but to continue to search for their true identity.

Perhaps more importantly, Davis-Undiano has challenged the omission of the Mestizo in the aspects of everyday culture in the United States. He argues that Mexican Americans – the Mestizo – have contributed significantly to the culture and success of the United States. He maps a new awareness of the United States as intrinsically connected to the broader context of the Americas. At once native and new to the American Southwest, Mexican Americans have “come home” in a profound sense: they have reasserted their right to claim that land and U.S. culture as their own. Atzlan, you see, may not be a physical space but a state of mind, a state of belonging and sense of being part and contributing to the well being of the country.

While the book is highly intellectual with a dizzying array of sources befitting a doctoral dissertation, it has a clarifying impact that bridges critical gaps in the cultural history and evolution of the Mestizo. One of the most enjoyable parts of the book – at times it is overwhelming – is his examination of community celebrations like Day of the Dead, Cinco de Mayo, and lowrider car culture. He views them as examples of Mestizo influence on mainstream American culture. Woven throughout is the search for meaning and understanding of Mestizo identity.

Which brings us back to the skulls seen at “Dia de los Muertos” celebration and in the movie “Coco.” The skulls were always a part of the celebration, but when the Spanish arrived in the New World, they took on an added dimension – sugar.

The indigenous already had celebrations for their dead. The Catholic religion observed All Souls Day. As these two concepts melded, “Dia de los Muertos” emerged. The Spanish discovered sugar in the New World, a delicacy not found in Europe. The Spanish enslaved the indigenous and had them work the sugar cane fields that fed the new craving for sugar in the old world. Hundreds of thousands died. Thus, in remembering them, the indigenous coated the skulls with sugar.

“Mestizo Come Home!” is a landmark account of Mexican American culture and the evolution of Mestizo in the Americas. It shows that mestizos are essential to U.S. national culture. Davis-Undiano, however, is not just talking to the Mexican American or Mestizo here, he is putting forth an argument for social justice when it comes to the treatment of a people who have been ignored as contributors to the American experience. It cries out for the country’s democratic ideals to finally recognize the contributions of the Mestizo – the Mexican American.

About the author

Robert Con Davis-Undiano is a professor at the University of Oklahoma and executive director of World Literature Today. Among his many publications are “The Paternal Romance: Reading God-the-Father in Early Western Culture” and “Criticism and Culture: The Role of the Critique in Modern Library Theory.”